Also, one shouldn’t get through the holiday season entirely without anything from David Sedaris‘s memories of working as a store elf:

The woman grabbed my arm and said: You there, elf. Tell Riley here that if he doesn’t start behaving immediately, then Santa’s going to change his mind and bring him coal for Christmas.

I said that Santa changed his policy and no longer traffics in coal. Instead, if you’re bad, he comes to your house and steals things. I told Riley that if he didn’t behave himself, Santa was going to take away his TV and all his electrical appliances and leave him in the dark.

The woman got a worried look on her face and said: All right. That’s enough. I said, he’s going to take your car and your furniture, and all of your towels and blankets and leave you with nothing. The mother said, No, that’s enough – really.

More importantly, did you finish your shopping? Either way, here’s a consideration from the New Yorker circa 1970, in which a certain “Christmas Consultant” ponders what a good gift for a guy could be:

My list would include useful gifts, like a matched, color-coördinated, full-fashioned set of pre-written thank-you letters. Such a pleasant gift, and so easy to use. Upon receiving a gift—let’s say a myna bird trained to say “You’re wonderful, Fred,” or “Joe,” or “Pierpont”—one would merely use the efficient index system provided and come up with a pre-written note that said something like “I can’t begin to describe to you the emotion which welled up inside of me when I first heard Precious Myna chirp out, ‘You’re wonderful, Fred,’ or ‘Joe,’ or ‘Pierpont.’” There is, you see, a crying need for a pre-written note in such circumstances, since no self-respecting fellow, however practiced in hypocrisy, could possibly bang one out for himself.

Whatever your gift-giving situation, or views on the Mayan apocalypse that wasn’t, you should take a snow day—we’ve all earned it: